18-07-2025
His Old Books Look Great Beside New Clothes
To run a buzzy men's wear shop in New York these days, it helps to have a few things. Great clothes, of course. Tasteful décor (Noguchi lanterns and ceramic vessels are de rigueur). Friendly, stylish salespeople certainly don't hurt.
Increasingly, a stack of books is also a must. Preferably of rare and elusive provenance, concerning matters of art and design, and, in many cases, provided by a neatly dressed bespectacled man named Geoff Snack.
'Whenever I put books in a retail store, it's like: How can this help people?' Mr. Snack, 40, said one afternoon this spring. 'How can this contribute to the understanding of what this shop is about, what the brands are about?'
He was flipping through a pile of books he had sourced for the clothing store and coffee shop Colbo on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. Stacked on a small table beside a rack of earth-toned clothing were ones featuring Cindy Sherman's shape-shifting photos, an Ellsworth Kelly catalog and a volume dedicated to the concept of sisterhood.
'It's like the cafe and music we play,' said Eldar Hadad, one of Colbo's owners, as she sold sugar-dusted morning buns. 'It invites you to linger when you have books — you can skim through and you're welcome to stay, read, have a coffee.'
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